"Three years after the launch of the most aggressive nationwide strategy in a generation to solve homelessness, there is evidence that it may be working:
The number of street people in cities across the United States has plummeted for
the first time since the 1980s. "
The drop-off reflected in street counts of the homeless taken over the past year has ranged from 30 percent in Miami and 28 percent in Dallas to 20 percent in Portland, Ore., and 13 percent in New York. In all, 30 jurisdictions reported declines in their homeless populations, including the 28 percent dip recorded in San Francisco a year ago and a 4 percent drop reported this week in Denver.
The figures emerged as more than 250 civic and social program leaders -- all of whom are behind 10-year plans to end chronic homelessness across the nation -- gathered in Denver last week to compare notes for the first time since the Bush administration began pushing for creation of the plans in 2003
According to the SFGate, a program heavily pushed by the Bush administration to reduce / relieve homelessness is achieving stellar results...but good luck finding the story on the wires or reported in other media.
A search at news.google.com shows that the ONLY news media source reporting this story is apparently the San Francisco Chronicle. How's that for a weird turnabout? A large meeting of city, state and Federal officials, talking about one of the largest stories in America, and only the San Francisco Chronicle covered it?
It's all part of BIRFEB (Bush Is Responsible For Everything Bad) of course. The man can't catch a break on good news. Remember when unemployment "skyrocketed" from 4.6% to 5.6%? It was all over the news right? People discussing how President Bush has squandered the "Clinton legacy". Frontpages of newspapers, splashed across websites, endlessly covered by television news...but now that it is back down to 4.7% it's reported as an "also ran" type of story. The velocity just isn't there on the good news story.
Is this due to the old "if it bleeds it leads" attitude of the media, or more evidence of media bias against President Bush?
hat tip to Tim Blair for the original reporting on the conference